Kraken Drops Monero Questions, Keeps XMR Caps

Kraken has withdrawn compliance emails that asked customers who bought and withdrew Monero (XMR) to explain their employer, their source of funds and what they planned to do with their coins. Arjun Sethi, co-chief executive of Kraken’s parent Payward, said in an X post on 24 October that the emails “were wrong” and that “no rule required it”.

The limits on moving Monero in and out of the exchange are unchanged. Kraken’s support page on deposit and withdrawal limits still caps individual XMR withdrawals at $1,500 and deposits at $3,500 over any rolling 30-day period. Sethi did not mention the caps.

In brief

Kraken has withdrawn emails that asked Monero buyers for their employer, source of funds and plans for their coins, Arjun Sethi says.
Sethi says “no rule required” the requests, and that the question about what customers do with their coins is “gone”.
Kraken’s limits for XMR remain: $1,500 in withdrawals and $3,500 in deposits for individuals over any rolling 30 days.

What Sethi said went wrong

According to Sethi, clients “who bought xmr with their own money and withdrew it got an email asking for employer, source of funds and what they planned to do with their coins”. He described the trigger bluntly, saying “someone saw a young client with a lot of money and called it a red flag. that is not a red flag. that is our customer and client”.

He wrote that “those requests are withdrawn and the clients have been told nothing is required of them”, and that the “‘what will you do with your coins’ question is gone and unacceptable”.

He drew a line between two kinds of question. In Sethi’s words, “where your money came from is a fair question. what you do with it after it leaves is not”. He added that “xmr stays listed. buy it here, take it home. that is the product”. Kraken has not said how many customers received the emails.

Source-of-funds checks remain

Sethi’s reversal is narrower than it may look. According to CryptoSlate, Kraken’s compliance policy still lets it ask for bank statements, investment records and other documents that show how customers came by their money. A separate policy updated on 1 October allows it to seek more documents after routine account reviews or changes in activity, including unusually large transfers.

Customers who fail to answer legitimate information requests may face limits on deposits or trading while their accounts are reviewed, CryptoSlate reported, adding that Kraken says those restrictions leave withdrawals untouched.

The caps on Monero

Kraken’s support page says monthly limits on XMR deposits and withdrawals took effect on 15 August 2026, “as part of Kraken’s ongoing efforts to maintain risk-based compliance controls while continuing to support XMR trading and transfers.” The limits apply on a rolling 30-day basis:

Individual accounts: $3,500 in deposits and $1,500 in withdrawals.
Corporate accounts: $30,000 in deposits and $10,000 in withdrawals.

By contrast, the same page says other cryptocurrency deposits are unlimited and crypto withdrawal limits are dynamic.

For customers in Europe, the issue is older. According to CryptoSlate, Kraken stopped XMR trading and deposits for clients in the European Economic Area on 31 October 2024 and converted any balances left after 31 December 2024 into bitcoin. Sethi’s post does not change that.

Kraken is separating compliance from control

Sethi’s distinction maps onto a real line in anti-money-laundering practice. Asking where money came from is the core of customer due diligence, and Kraken is keeping it. Asking what a customer will do with coins after they leave the platform is different: it treats a lawful withdrawal to self-custody as suspicious in itself. Withdrawing that question removes the part of the emails that compliance teams would find hardest to justify, especially as Sethi says no rule required it.

The episode also shows how flagging rules go wrong. On Sethi’s own account, the trigger was a young customer with a lot of money. Age and wealth alone are a weak basis for suspicion, and for a monitoring team they produce false positives that cost customer trust.

The $1,500 cap still does the heavy lifting

For Monero holders, the caps matter more than the questionnaire. A $1,500 limit on withdrawals in any rolling 30 days means an individual who buys more than that cannot take it all home quickly, which sits awkwardly beside Sethi’s “buy it here, take it home” line. Kraken frames the caps as a risk-based control that keeps XMR listed. Its support page does not say whether they will change.

Privacy coins remain a pressure point for regulated exchanges, as the debate over Zcash swap privacy shows, and regulators such as the FCA keep updating financial crime guidance. Payward is also seeking a bank licence in Europe through its planned purchase of Saldo Bank and has won final approval in Dubai. For now, Kraken has dropped one question and kept the $1,500 ceiling.